Jane Ellison: I echo the comments that have been made about credit unions. I am sure that many of us, on both sides of the Committee, have credit unions in our local area. There is an excellent one in Wandsworth, which I do what I can to support with publicity and signposting for constituents. I certainly place on the record our admiration for the credit union movement. As the shadow Minister,  the hon. Member for Bootle, said, there will be a meeting. His colleague the hon. Member for Harrow West made a very good speech on Second Reading, and I am glad that that meeting will take place.
This debate is about who provides the Help to Save product. We were clear in our consultation that the options for delivery were to engage a single provider to guarantee nationwide provision, or to open the opportunity to offer the account to a wider range of providers on a voluntary basis. Although we are keen to explore the potential for credit unions to be involved and we of course acknowledge, as I have done, the valuable work that they do in our communities, we believe that they could not guarantee the nationwide provision of accounts that we seek.
Appointing National Savings and Investments as the scheme provider, which we have obviously made public, does involve our funding it for nationwide account provision, but it also means that we can work with a single provider to ensure that accounts are easily accessible to all eligible people, and it removes what could be the significant administrative and compliance costs associated with allowing a range of providers to offer accounts. Those could include costs associated with approving providers, checking for multiple account opening, checking and paying bonus claims from different providers and ensuring that each provider is operating the account correctly.
An option whereby we funded NS&I to provide accounts while we also allowed other providers to offer accounts on a voluntary basis would not provide value for money in this environment. A product such as this operates very much at the value-for-money end of the market. However, I am clear that we should not rule out the option for a range of providers, including credit unions, voluntarily to offer accounts in the future if that would deliver national coverage, and I reassure the Committee that the Bill has been drafted to accommodate different models of account provision, should that situation arise. In the meantime, we will work with the credit union sector to explore further options for Help to Save that work for them.
The hon. Member for Bootle has indicated that he will not seek to press the amendment to a vote, and with those points and that clarification in mind, I urge him to withdraw it.

Jane Ellison: The amendment is about auto-enrolling individuals into Help to Save accounts. I understand the motivation, and given the evidence from StepChange the Government do not doubt the sincerity of the intention and the desire to help people to save. However, we have concerns, and I shall explain why we cannot support the amendment.
The amendment would provide for arrangements allowing employers or benefit paying bodies to divert money from employees’ pay or benefits into a Help to  Save account, unless they chose to opt out. To return an earlier debate about auto-enrolment, we all believe that it has been a huge success in pension saving. However, while there is a strong case for auto-enrolling people into long-term pension savings, we do not think that is the case for the rainy-day savings that Help to Save is designed to support.
We want a decision to save into an account to be an active choice made by eligible individuals at a time that is right for them. Given the focus on rainy-day savings, we think that many will want to use the account flexibly, putting aside what they can afford each month rather than committing to a fixed amount being deducted from their salary or tax credit payments. For those looking to make regular payments into a Help to Save account, a standing order that they control will be the best option. That is because many people who are eligible for Help to Save could well have more than one job or other changes in circumstances over the four-year period when they have an account. The target group for a Help to Save account is disproportionately more likely to have a series of different jobs or more than one job at the same time.
Nevertheless, an employer that wants to offer payroll deduction into a Help to Save account to its employees is perfectly free to do so—nothing in the legislation would stop them. The Government are aware of successful voluntary workplace savings schemes and we are keen to explore the role that employers and other local organisations can play to support people in getting access to Help to Save, but we have no intention of making that a statutory requirement at a time when we are still working with businesses to roll out and embed automatic enrolment into workplace pensions—particularly given the forthcoming rises in contribution rates. We think that that must remain the priority for employers. That takes us back to an earlier debate about the support we all give to auto-enrolment, and the desire not to confuse that picture.
I hope that, with those points in mind, the hon. Lady will withdraw her amendment.

Ian Blackford: I beg to move amendment 7, in schedule 1,page19,line31, at end insert—
‘(2A) Where a bankruptcy order is made against a person with a Help-to-Save account any bonus paid into the Help-to-Save account will not form part of a debtors estate during insolvency proceedings.
(2B) Any bonus paid into a Help-to-Save account shall not be liable to be taken as repayment via third party debt orders.’
The amendment would ensure that those subject to a bankruptcy order would not be stripped of their assets. Currently, Help to Save affords no protection to the Government bonus paid into accounts from insolvency proceedings or third-party debt orders from creditors.  The Government need to look closely at the debt collection and insolvency implications of the scheme. Given the target audience of Help to Save, it is likely that many will face financial difficulties while holding a Help to Save account. That would leave them vulnerable to third-party debt orders and potential insolvency.

Adjourned till Tuesday 1 November at twenty-five minutes past Nine o’clock.
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